Kalamazoo, MI – Chris Raniere has been making his presence felt all week, the infielder continued Friday night with his ninth home run as the River City Rascals down the Kalamazoo Kings 6-2.

Raniere teed off against Jeff Long in the third inning as the Rascals trailed 1-0. His shot to left was his third in five games to tie the game at one.

Chris Clem got out of a one out, bases loaded jam in the bottom of the first inning with only allowing one run. That sparked the Rascals offense as they responded with four unanswered runs.

After the Raniere home run in the third, the Rascals scored three in the fifth. Andrew Sweet and Brad Hough both singled. Raniere then walked to load the bases. Luke Barganier would follow the walk with a two run single to center field to make it 3-1. Phil Laurent knocked in Raniere with a fly ball to right field.

Down 4-1, Kalamazoo scored its final run in the bottom half of the inning when Jeff Grose doubled home Brandon Anderson all the way from first.

Long allowed two more Rascal runs the very next inning when Ryan Wehrle doubled home Dan Maycock who singled and stole a base. Wehrle was then plated three batters later as Raniere struck again. The offensive star of the game bounced one past the drawn in infield for a 6-2 advantage.

Clem worked through 6.2 innings and finished with six strikeouts and only one walk in the win. For Clem it was his second road win and improved his recorded to 7-7. Long fell to 8-4 for Kalamazoo after getting tacked with six earned in seven innings. Pat Evers tossed 2.1 innings of scoreless baseball to close out the ballgame.

River City is now 3-1 against the Frontier League’s best team. The Rascals (41-44) send 7-5 Danny Powers to the mound Saturday night in game two of the series. Game time is scheduled for 7:05 p.m. EDT. Catch the Rascals on the road this season by tuning in to FM 104.5 KSLQ or online at RiverCityRascals.com.